Mad Men and the Limitations of Television Criticism

In the age of social media and digital technology, it seems as if everyone has an opinion to express. When it comes to television, especially, there is no shortage of online forums and fan communities in which lovers of a given television series engage in heated debates and passionate discussions. Henry Jenkins studies this in great detail in his book Textual Poachers: Television Fans and Participatory Culture, but one thing that he doesn’t really get into is whether or not this engagement is useful.

This article will use the recent reaction to “In Care Of,” the latest episode of Mad Men that just premiered and concluded the show’s sixth season, to consider whether or not criticism of a long-running television series is productive. By using various digital user generated content to exemplify the many different reactions to the season finale from so-called “fans” of the series, I hope to show that television criticism of a long-running series is nearly impossible to do.

Before I begin, it is perhaps necessary to note that I am a fan of Mad Men. I point this out precisely because I find it difficult after so many years of following the series and getting to know its many characters to criticize anything creator Matthew Weiner decides to do. Every Sunday night I am excited to watch the show, and despite what happens and what the characters do, I go with it and find it all so endlessly intriguing. Jon Hamm’s performance as Don Draper is brilliant and even when he is being a complete dog, I cannot help but be compelled by him. In other words, I’m so involved with the show and the many twists and turns it has taken over its six seasons that I am virtually incapable of criticizing it.

This is why it perplexes me even more to find that a number of Mad Men “fans” are not only disappointed in the season finale, but disappointed in the entirety of season six in general. On Goldderby, for instance, user Icky expresses his annoyance in Weiner for “leaning back on sad Don again.” Then there is SaraR, presumably a long-time fan of the series, who is angry that the show currently spends more time with newer characters like Bob and Ted as opposed to older characters like Roger, Joan, and Peggy.

The discourse on IMDB is a little more in-depth, and as a result, more emotional. For example, one thread entitled “What Don Should Have Done” basically considers an alternative action to the one Weiner gives us in the actual season finale. Fans are not satisfied by what Don did, so they instead consider what he should have done, presumably to rewrite what they think are the wrongs of the series. A similar thread features immediate reactions to the season finale, and although it is fun to read how seriously fans take a show that is, ultimately, a fictitious work, it is also a little despairing to know that fans are not above personal insults when other users disagree with them. There does seem to be a majority in the forums, and when one user comes along to disrupt that, he or she is typically called a “troll” for rocking the otherwise steady boat of conformity and agreement.

What does this fandom tell us about Mad Men? It seems that it merely tells us what it intends to tell us. That is, we can scroll through the forums or turn to Twitter to discover who likes the episode or who doesn’t. What is much harder to glean from all of this, I think, is how any of this criticism can be useful.

It can be argued that there is a certain value in television criticism that cannot be denied. For instance, when a show like The Killing premiers, it is much easier to determine whether or not the themes, characters, narrative, and aesthetics are successfully presented within each episode. Many critics and fans who followed along with the first season were ultimately disappointed with the finale because it essentially failed to do what it said it what do: tell us who killed Rosie Larsen. It started out with a promising premise and kept our interest throughout, and when the finale arrived it appeared as if we were finally going to discover the killer’s identity. Then, to much outrage, the series incorporated a final “twist” that turned everything on its head and left us in the dark. We call the first season unsuccessful, or “bad,” because the creator Veena Sud seemingly presented an implausible twist for the sake of shock. Although there are undoubtedly those who have stuck with the series and continue to watch it today, most agree that the first season, at the very least, was worthy of our negative criticism. But this can only be done, I suggest, after we watch the entire first season and get a sense of the narratives, themes, characterizations, and aesthetics of the series. Even then, however, it is a mixed bag, as it is awfully difficult to judge exactly where a television series goes wrong (or right). Further, other individuals often make a strong case that The Killing is not the bad series most critics and fans claimed it to be after the first season. What this leaves us with, ultimately, is confusion. Then, of course, is the fact that certain shows depreciate or appreciate in value as time goes by.

It might be fruitful to criticize a show on a stylistic, aesthetic level. In other words, when we watch Mad Men, we might be able to determine its quality based upon the art direction, cinematography, editing, acting, etc. But how many shows are poorly made on a technical, aesthetic level? Very few, I would argue. So would this mean, then, that every single show with quality aesthetics is by default a “good” show that is worthy of our attention? I don’t think it can be that simple.

There is also another approach to television criticism that I would call comparative criticism. That is, critics and fans compare one show to another in order to determine whether or not it is “good” or “bad.” But is this fair to do? And how far do these comparisons extend? For example, new series on HBO are often compared to previous HBO series. But can anything really be gained from comparing Luck to The Sopranos or The Wire? Isn’t every single show on HBO going to seem mediocre in comparison to the two greatest television series in the history of the medium? Moreover, what happens when the shows being compared are aesthetically and thematically different? When Lena Dunham’s Girls premiered, for instance, many critics and fans compared it to Sex and the City, simply because both shows are on HBO and both follow the lives of four women. But as we have come to find, the two are radically different in both style and tone, and they do not belong in the same category. Then there is The Newsroom, which had many critics comparing it to creator Aaron Sorkin’s previous television work, as if he is not allowed to explore new horizons and will always be judged by what he accomplished in his past.

There is a second type of comparative criticism that is more common but still inefficient. This is when a given episode of a series is compared to the broader medium and our expectations that go along with watching episodic television. For example, one would determine the success of “In Care Of” based upon how it measures as a standard season finale. That is, does it have enough dramatic bite? Is it “big” enough to warrant a finale? It is fair to say that Mad Men has been pretty consistent in delivering dramatic finales that satisfy the viewer’s craving for something “major” to happen. “In Care Of,” especially ,is a game-changing episode that many of us did not see coming. But other great series, including The Sopranos, have often delivered quieter, more contemplative finales. Does this make these shows or these episodes “bad’ simply because they do not adhere to our conventional standards? I certainly hope not.

Then there is the third and final type of comparative criticism that seems to get at the heart of what television criticism can offer. This is the case of fans and critics comparing the series to itself. For Mad Men, this usually means fans determining whether or not season six measures up to previous seasons. But this seems problematic because it is dependent entirely upon preference and taste. Who can truly say, for example, which Mad Men season is the “best” when they are all a part of a larger, continuing narrative? By contrast, is it possible to say that Mad Men is “good” if it is not yet completed? Where do we draw the line? Do we judge each episode separately, or within the context of the season? And then how do we judge the season? As a cohesive whole, or as a product of a larger series? What do we do when the series is still on the air?

This leads to my conclusion that is is arbitrary and inefficient to criticize a long-running TV show like Mad Men. Fans are inevitably going to be mixed over how Matthew Weiner decides to tell his story. Some, like SaraR, become disappointed when Weiner pushes aside old characters for new ones, while others, like Icky, are annoyed that Don returns to his old, unattractive self. Even more telling, however, are the fans who love the show too much to be able to determine whether or not what they are watching on the screen is “good” or “bad.” They are just happy to be there, week after week, as voyeurs of these complex, fictitious characters as they navigate the terrain of this endlessly fascinating world.

What is productive, then, is in-depth discussion of the thematic, aesthetic, and narrative elements of a series. For instance, it is useful to watch “In Care Of” and debate the thematic and narrative significance of Don’s decision to tell the truth, as opposed to criticizing whether or not the decision benefits the series or is ‘true” to the series’ thematic and narrative intentions. After all, how can anything be true to a show’s intentions if the show, by default, is fiction? Anything depicted within the world of the series will be constructed for dramatic effect, and as a result, no such truth can exist. The discussion often gets carried away, I believe, because many users tend to forget that the series is fiction and that the characters do not exist. In effect, users take what happens on a series personally, as if Sally’s discovery of Don’s affair in “Favors” actually matters outside of the construction of the series. When this episode first aired, for example, many threads on IMDB discussed how Sally’s future would be “destroyed” by her discovery, as if she were a real person we should worry about. This can be beneficial if it contributes to a discussion of the series as a work of art with a focus on theme, narrative, characterization, or aesthetic, but it is often bogged down by trivial, reductive comments like, “Don wouldn’t do that in real life,” or, “I don’t buy Sally’s reaction.” The implication that stems from these comments is: “I know these characters, and what they just did complicates my knowledge, and I don’t like that, so I’m going to say that their actions are the product of bad writing and unrealistic storytelling because I don’t want to think about what these changes mean and how they challenge my view of the series.”

I acknowledge that it is fun to debate our favorite television series and part of the joy that comes with watching television is the ability to discuss what happens with other fans. But the discussion needs to extend beyond the mere “good” or “bad” value judgments that fans often place upon the episodes. It hardly matters whether we like what happens or not. What matters more, I believe, is what happens, why we think it happens, and how this contributes to our understanding of the overall series.

What do you think? Leave a comment.